In rare move, national Democrats come out against primary candidate Laura Moser in bid for Culberson's seat

The campaign arm of Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives set its sights on a surprising target Thursday: Democratic congressional hopeful Laura Moser.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee posted negative research on Moser, a Houston journalist vying among six other Democrats in the March 6 primary to unseat Republican U.S. Rep. John Culberson. Democrats locally and nationally have worried that Moser is too liberal to carry a race that has emerged in recent months as one of the most competitive races in the country.

The DCCC posting, which features the kind of research that is often reserved for Republicans, notes that Moser only recently moved back to her hometown of Houston and that much of her campaign fundraising money has gone to her husband's political consulting firm. It also calls her a "Washington insider." ...

The Texas 7th Congressional District is new offensive territory for Democrats and an ancestral GOP stronghold. But Hillary Clinton carried the district in 2016, and a flood of Democrats soon raced to run for the seat. ...

Moser's bid has been picking up momentum practically daily. Earlier on Thursday, her campaign announced it had raised nearly $150,000 in the first 45 days of the year. And she has amassed in recent months a massive online following for a first-time Congressional candidate. She is also a favorite interview subject of national publications, women's magazines and has a passionate following among many people who supported U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016. ...

For months, Democrats in Congress and those who work on campaigns were quietly worried about how Moser would play in a moderate district like the 7th, which encompasses wealthy enclaves of West Houston and stretches out into the suburb of Katy.

The Texas Democrat who was targeted by the House Democrats’ campaign arm is projected to advance to a primary runoff in the race to unseat Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas).

Laura Moser, a journalist and activist, will run against lawyer Lizzie Pannill Fletcher in the May 22 runoff, since none of the seven Democratic candidates was able to get a majority of the vote. Fletcher came in first but failed to win enough votes to avert a runoff, while Moser came in second.

The Associated Press projected Fletcher to finish in the top spot Tuesday evening, while it waited to make the call on Moser until past midnight. As of 1:30 a.m. Wednesday, Fletcher had 29 percent of the vote to Moser's 24 percent.

Moser’s advancement to the runoff comes despite a controversial attack by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) against her.

The memo release was an unusual move for the DCCC, which usually stays out of Democratic primaries. It even earned them a rebuke from Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez.

“I wouldn’t have done it,” he said in a Sunday interview on C-SPAN’s Newsmakers. “We’re at our best as Democrats when we talk about the issues. … I don’t believe we should be anointing candidates. The people in Texas are the people who should be making the choices in Texas.”

Texas runoff between Laura Moser and Lizzie Pannill Fletcher a pivotal moment for national Democrats

HOUSTON — Houston Democratic players are now calling what was once the wildest Democratic primary in the state a word not spoken often in Texas politics: boring.

But even as local political junkies are tiring of the national drama surrounding the 7th Congressional District's Democratic primary in west Houston featuring attorney Lizzie Pannill Fletcher and activist Laura Moser, what happens here Tuesday night will have outsized implications for national Democrats' optimism and tactics in their bid to take control of the U.S. House in the fall. ...

The DCCC is far more careful in how it approaches this race now compared to February. But it’s plain the committee prefers Fletcher. She also has the backing of EMILY’s List, which is often a player in the fall campaigns of their endorsed female Democratic candidates who back abortion rights.

It’s hard to imagine the DCCC, many members of Congress and EMILY’s List changing lanes after all of the drama in the primary and going on to spend millions on Moser in the fall – but it’s a weird climate this cycle and stranger things have happened.

All surface signs indicate that Fletcher has the inside track on winning the nomination on Tuesday.

How informed is the DCCC about the politics of Texas 7th CD? Did they actually know that Fletcher could win the general election and that Moser could not? Or are they afraid of the progressives in the Democratic Party? I still do not trust the DNC and its activities.

“The truth is, we know so little about life, we don’t really know what the good news is and what the bad news is.” Kurt Vonnegut